Varanasi

Sunset on our first night in Varanasi (before the Bhang got us)
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Varanasi was an enchanting, mystical, and spiritual place, crawling with hippies and damn scary at night! We stayed at a place that had a view of the Ganges river and every day had to pass the burning ghat to get to our place. It is amazing how Indians truly regard the body as nothing but the casing of the spirit and how death is just one reincarnation closer to enlightenment. In fact, Hindus believe that having your body burned in Varanasi and your ashes put in the Ganges River will be the end of mohksha - release from the endless cycle of rebirths and the way to reach enlightenment. The families of the deceased were not sad - nobody was crying or throwing themselves on the pyre.

One of many kites out flying everyday in Varanasi
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Most of the time in Varanasi we walked along the Ganges and viewed daily life at the ghats. Everything revolves around this river. On the last day we took a boat ride on the Ganges… I was dying to dip my hand in, but after being told it would likely fall off due to the ridiculous amount of pollution, I decided to keep my hand. I need it for sports:)

From Varanasi, Laura and I left our two male companions/bodyguards and took the night train back to Agra to meet our personal driver. That's right people, we decided to posh it out for the rest of the trip and rent a car and driver to take us everywhere (‘cause we are such posh girls). No actually, after a week of traveling by train we had had enough - the trains were often full, and delayed (our last train stopped us on the tracks for an extra 6 hrs) and trying to get a ticket was like… I don't know… just something that is really hard to do. For $500USD, our driver Panchee (who doesn't speak a lick of English) will drive us wherever we want to go, whenever we want… SWEET!